Report from District nonprofit says agency lacks leadership' and calls for overhaul

The Prince George's County executive's office said a recent report criticizing the county's housing department is outdated, reflecting problems occurring two years ago that have largely been resolved.

A report released last week by the Coalition for Smarter Growth, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit organization, said the county's Department of Housing and Community Development "lacks leadership" and is plagued by an "inability to administer federal funds." The report also called on presumptive county executive Rushern L. Baker III to launch a search for people capable of running the agency responsible for providing affordable rental and public housing.

"We wanted to say to the next executive, You need to find someone who understands [housing programs],'" said Cheryl Cort, coalition policy director. "Other jurisdictions have figured out how to do it."

The report cites numerous problems in the department, including losing federal money after failing to spend it within mandated timelines and continuing "egregious compliance issues" and "inconsistent" plans on how to handle housing needs.

More than 46 percent of county residents spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing, according to the report. That percentage is 8 percentage points higher than the average for region, which includes Montgomery County, Washington, D.C., and Arlington and Fairfax counties in Virginia.

A spokesman for Baker said the incoming executive had no comment on the report. Throughout his election campaign this summer, Baker repeatedly cited the agency as requiring a major overhaul. Baker faces no opposition in the Nov. 2 general election.

County housing officials denied requests to interview the department's director, James Johnson. Johnson took over two years ago, after former director Tommie Thompson was fired by County Executive Jack B. Johnson (D), no relation to James Johnson, for undisclosed reasons.

James Keary, spokesman for Jack Johnson, said the report is mostly based on data from Thompson's tenure and said the agency has improved its performance.

"Ever since James Johnson has come in, they have met their deadlines," Keary said, adding that some housing programs have achieved national recognition for their success.

Keary pointed to the Down Payment on Your Dream program, in which officials used a $10.8 million grant to give up to $20,000 in closing cost assistance for people willing to buy foreclosed county homes. More than 600 people were able to purchase homes under the program, which launched in June 2009 and ended this fall.

Cort called the program "the exception to the rule" in Prince George's.

Authors of the report said data from as recent as March that places the county in the bottom 17 percent of the nation for helping low-income renters shows the department is still in need of changes.

Cort cited a case in January when DHCD had to give back $2 million in federal funding after failing to use the money since it was given in 2004. The money was intended to be used rehabilitating homes for rent and providing rental assistance to low-income residents.

In April, the department was in danger of having to return another $2.8 million from the Community Development Block Gant, a program that allows jurisdictions to spend money on a wide variety of community needs such as sidewalk improvements and financial counseling. That money, which had not been spent for three years, was retained after county officials rushed approval on numerous projects 10 days before the deadline.

"That was especially surprising, because it's easy to use [CDBG] money on a whole lot of things," Cort said.

According to a Department of Housing and Community Development report issued last month, the county spent more than $178.3 million on its programs last year, including community grants, public housing assistance, service for homeless residents and public housing.

For the last two years, Johnson and other housing officials have repeatedly declined to discuss the department's performance, and Cort said requests by authors of the report to meet with the department to discuss the issues were also declined.

"That's really part of the problem," Cort said, adding that the agency needs to be more transparent. "Clearly something's wrong."

Cort also said nonprofit organizations that try to work with the county encounter a "bottleneck" when it comes to getting legal and administrative approval of projects.